And Joshua broke the power of Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword.
Israel's first battle after leaving Egypt ends in a single line: Joshua defeats Amalek in the valley. But the chapter has already shown where that strength came from: not the swordsmen below, but the hands lifted on the hill.
The timing matters. The fight breaks out right after the rock is struck and the water flows.
In type, Israel had been sheltered from judgment by the blood of the lamb, and redeemed from the world and Satan at the Red Sea. They had been miraculously fed, and now through the smitten rock the gushing water, a picture of the Spirit, had been given. Immediately afterwards Amalek appears, a picture of the flesh. How fitting all this is!… So it is not until we as believers receive the Holy Spirit that this conflict begins. In our unconverted days the flesh reigned supreme, and its power in our lives was unchallenged.
The name itself tells you what this enemy does.
Amalek speaks therefore of the lusts of the flesh. Its name means "licking up," for such lusts lick up all that is beneficial and necessary for our soul's welfare. This is not Satan's attack, but an attack from within us, fed by the desire to get what we want when we want it.
Commentators differ here. Some say that naming the flesh does not go far enough:
What then does Amalek symbolise? It is often said that he is the flesh; but this is only part of the truth… The point to be seen here is that Amalek sets himself in open opposition to the people of God. He seeks to hinder their progress, and even to destroy them from the face of the earth. It is therefore the power of Satan — acting through the flesh, it may be — that challenges the onward march of the children of Israel.
The man at the head of the fighting men points past himself.
Joshua represents Christ, in the energy of the Spirit, leading His redeemed to the conflict. What a consolation! If Satan marshals his forces to attack the Lord's people, Christ leads out His chosen men to meet the foe. The battle therefore is the Lord's… It would help us to stop depending on man, and to count upon the Lord.
Being on the right side of the war was not enough on its own.
They fought the Lord's battle: but it is not enough even to be fighting the Lord's battle unless the Lord stretches out His hand to help them. Otherwise "Amalek prevailed." Israel might have reasoned about the way they fought, about the strength of the enemy, and about ten thousand other things. But in the end, their success depended on Moses' hands being stretched out. It is very hard for us to see ourselves and Satan as nothing, and God as everything.
Two things happen at once here, and they belong together.
Christ has fought for us; the Holy Spirit fights in us… The comfort is that we are victors before we enter the field of conflict at all… We have here two distinct things: conflict and intercession. Christ is on high for us, while the Holy Spirit carries on the mighty struggle in us. The two things go together. It is as we enter, by faith, into the power of Christ's intercession on our behalf, that we make headway against our evil nature.
The weapon itself matters. (Older translations read "with the edge of the sword" where the ESV has simply "with the sword.")
Let us remember, too, that it was "with the edge of the sword" that Joshua defeated his enemies. And the "sword of the Spirit is the word of God."… It is this which enables self-judgment — the judgment of the foes of our peace and blessing. Our Amalek is within. Our battleground is that of our own hearts.
Joshua won the day, but the enemy was not wiped out. That difference matters for how a believer reads his own experience.
Amalek was driven back and defeated, but he was not yet utterly destroyed, as he will be… There is power for us to keep the sentence of death on the flesh, so that we do not fulfil its lust. We are kept from doing the things we otherwise might. But the flesh still remains in us, though we have received the Spirit.
- Water, then war. The conflict starts only once the Spirit comes. Struggle inside a believer is a sign of new life, not proof against it.
- Amalek named. Some writers read him as the lusts of the flesh. Others see Satan's power working through the flesh. Either way, he is an enemy who wants to stop God's people moving forward.
- Joshua below. Christ leads His redeemed into the fight by the Spirit. So the battle is the Lord's, not ours.
- Hands above. Fighting on the right side is not enough on its own. The battle below turned on the hands held up above. Conflict in us rests on intercession for us.
- Sword in hand. Victory came by the sword: the word of God turned on our own hearts. The win is real, but the enemy is not wiped out yet.
And Jehovah said to Moses, Write this [for] a memorial in the book, and rehearse [it] in the ears of Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under the heavens.
Israel had just beaten back the Amalekites at Rephidim. God's first answer to the victory was not a monument but a command to write. He tells Moses to write the event in a book and read it aloud to Joshua. To it He attaches a sentence He will carry out Himself: Amalek's memory will be wiped out completely.
This is where the written word of God begins.
The first mention of writing in the Bible is when "the Lord said to Moses, write this as a memorial in a book" (Ex. 17:14). That small beginning is God putting His thoughts in writing for man. From it grows the full development we have in the Bible, where God makes known all His counsels and glories.
Amalek's family line shapes what he stands for.
Amalek came from Esau, the man of bodily appetite, who sold his birthright for a meal. So he makes a fitting picture of the flesh.
Commentators differ on how far that picture reaches. One writer says that calling Amalek "the flesh" stops short of the full meaning. Amalek came out to block a whole nation's march and wipe it off the earth.
What, then, does Amalek stand for? Many say he stands for the flesh, but that is only part of the truth… The point to see here is that Amalek sets himself in open opposition to the people of God. He seeks to hinder their progress, and even to destroy them from off the face of the earth. So it is the power of Satan — perhaps acting through the flesh — that challenges the forward march of the children of Israel.
Amalek attacked by stealth. The sentence God passes on such an enemy is not correction but removal.
Amalek was a very cunning foe, as we discover when we read Deuteronomy 25:18. In our experience the flesh acts in just this way. It attacks us at what we may call our weak points — though these are often the points we imagine to be our strong ones! God then passed the sentence of death on Amalek in its most extreme form, as we see in verse 14. In the same way God has "condemned sin in the flesh" in the death of Christ.
What God writes down for His people looks in two directions.
This memorial combined two things: the record of their rescue from Amalek, and the pledge of his final overthrow. Every display of the Lord's power on behalf of His people has this double character. If He steps in and defends them against their enemies' attacks, that same act assures them of His continual protection and care. So every time He comes between them and their foes, it should be repeated in their ears and written on their hearts — a memorial of the past, and a guarantee of His unchanging defence.
The promise to blot out Amalek is not a promise that the fighting stops soon.
I dare say many of us have thought, when we have seen the necessity of dependence on the Lord, that one good battle with Satan, and all will be over; but no such thing. We have security and the certainty of victory. But we have no promise that conflict will stop while we are in the wilderness… God told Israel He would utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven; yet still the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation. Until Christ comes, until Satan is bound, until we have the full result of victory, we must count on conflict. Not slavery to Pharaoh, but war with Amalek. Our comfort is this: it is the Lord who makes war, though He does it through Israel, and so Israel has to fight.
Centuries later God acted on this word.
God had not forgotten what Amalek did to Israel, as told in Exodus 17:8-16. Now the time had come to carry out divine vengeance. God entrusted Saul with the duty of fulfilling the purpose He had announced long before (Ex. 17:14). Generations had come and gone since the Lord swore that He would utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. Had He forgotten His oath? No. The lapse of time made no change in His mind.
- Written. God's command to Moses is the Bible's first act of writing. Everything He later made known in Scripture grows from it.
- Written against an enemy. Amalek came from Esau, who sold his birthright for a meal. He pictures the flesh — and some see behind him the power of Satan opposing God's people.
- Written as a death sentence. God's verdict on Amalek was removal, not reform, matching how He "condemned sin in the flesh" at the cross.
- Written as a pledge. The record holds both a past rescue and a guarantee of the final overthrow still to come.
- Written for the fight ahead. Victory is certain, but the conflict continues. God's oath waited generations for Saul to act, and time never weakened it.